It is important that communication devices, such as cell phones, mobile telephone handsets, and the like, referred to herein as mobile telephones, be able to provide a user with relevant information about the operation of the mobile telephone, such as signal strength, remaining battery power, a dialed phone number, the phone number of an incoming call, and the like. Conventionally, such information has been provided via a visual graphical display, such as a liquid crystal display (LCD), light emitting diodes (LEDs), EL (electro-luminance).
There, however, are number of drawbacks associated with using such visual graphical displays. For example, visual graphical displays are costly, thereby potentially precluding many people from being able to own a mobile telephone. A continuing effort is also being made to make mobile telephones as volumetrically efficient as possible. It can readily be appreciated, however, that a visual graphical display will inherently limit the volumetric efficiency of a mobile telephone. To compensate for the additional volume required by a visual graphical display, the visual graphical display and/or keypad may be reduced in size, thereby rendering such display difficult to read, or such keypad difficult to use. Visual graphical displays also consume substantial battery power, a precious commodity for a mobile telephone. Still further, visual graphical displays are also prone to breakage, and a mobile telephone that relies on a visual graphical display is virtually worthless if its display is broken.
In an attempt to overcome the drawbacks associated with visual graphical displays, some mobile telephones are provided with dedicated indicators, which indicate the status of a single item, such as battery level or signal strength, without a visual graphical display. Such dedicated indicators, however, are generally limited to indicating only two states of an item, such as whether a battery level is below or above some predefined level. Furthermore, dedicated indicators also require volume, thereby imposing an additional limitation on how small a mobile telephone may be made.
Accordingly, a continuing search has been directed to the development of apparatuses and methods by which a mobile telephone may communicate information to a user in a manner which is relatively inexpensive, and which consumes less battery power and volume than conventional visual displays, and which is also less prone to breakage (i.e., more reliable) than conventional visual displays.